Reviews

Hard to believe, given the slew of awards she has received in the last 10 months, but soprano Leah Crocetto’s Schwabacher Debut Recital in Temple Emanu-el’s Meyer Sanctuary on Sunday afternoon was her first full-length classical recital anywhere. Despite her inexperience, the results were mind-boggling.

To say that Nicholas McGegan has earned an international reputation for his George Frideric Handel interpretations is a bit of an understatement. Indeed, the world actually seems to follow him wherever he goes, so long as he is traipsing hand-in-hand with Handel.

“Courageous and psychedelic” wowed one patron. “It wasn’t the Four Last Songs” (of Richard Strauss), belittled another.

The dance begins at sunrise, as French-Canadian conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin leads the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra into the “Lever du Jour” section of Maurice Ravel’s Daphnis et Chloé – Suite No.

“This collaboration is what I’m in it for,” declared the clearly delighted soprano Ann Moss, with a sweeping gesture that took in her fellow performers and the audience at the Noe Valley Ministry on Sunday afternoon.

The Left Coast Chamber Ensemble organized its April 5 concert at the War Memorial’s Green Room around the idea of visual inspirations for music. The theme of “Audible Visions” led to a creative program, with all but one piece written in the past 25 years, and many kinds of musical thinking. What really mattered, of course, was what we heard, and that was marvelous.